


What’s the Buzz? (tell me what’s a happening)

by Byrcca



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M, Just Another Day in the Delta Quadrant, Proto P/T
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2018-03-18
Packaged: 2019-04-04 07:26:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14015235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Byrcca/pseuds/Byrcca
Summary: How far will a man go and what will people say when he does?





	What’s the Buzz? (tell me what’s a happening)

**Author's Note:**

> Set sometime in early season two. I feel that Tom’s not the type to slugabed when he has a morning off. He’s sociable and curious, and gets bored too easily.

***

“Hey, Maquis, you okay?”

“I dunno. I may be dying.” She raised her head and squinted at him, frowning. “There are days when I wish for a quick death.” She was sitting with her elbows on the table, her head resting in her hands, a cold cup of coffee forgotten in front of her.

“What’s wrong?” Harry was instantly all concern, touching her shoulder, his hand settling on her upper arm. 

“Just a headache. My neck, shoulders. Backache. A full body ache, really.” She waved a hand at him. “I’m used to it.”

Harry frowned. “Did something happen? Did you get hurt?” It had been a fairly peaceful few days, no run in with angry aliens, no particle waves that sent him flying across the bridge.

“No. No. Engineering can get a little physical, you know that.” She rubbed the back of her neck. “It’ll go away eventually.”

“You might have sprained something. Why don’t you go see the doc, have him check you out? He could give you an analgesic.”

She smiled at that, but he could still see the pain in her eyes. “Because if I did that, I’d have to see the Doctor. I’d rather put up with it.” 

He took a gulp of his coffee and stood moving around to stand behind her chair. She craned her neck to follow him. “Libby, my fiancée?” She nodded, she knew who Libby was. “She’s a professional musician. She used to get muscle aches from practicing.”

“Thanks for the information. Nice to know I'm not alone,” B’Elanna mumbled. 

Harry smiled. He was getting used to being teased. “I meant I could rub your shoulders. I used to do it for her all the time. I’m pretty good at it.” He waggled his fingers at her.

That brought her head up again and she glanced around the mess hall. It wasn’t crowded, but it certainly wasn’t empty, either. “I…”

“C’mon, B’Elanna, no one cares.”

She stilled for a moment then nodded, and Harry stepped behind her. He brushed her hair away from the back of her neck, and she stiffened. “Relax,” he said. He placed his hands on her shoulders, fingers brushing her collarbones, thumbs at the base of her neck along the spine, and squeezed. 

She moaned. 

His thumbs pressed into the muscle and arced downward and out, toward her shoulder blades.

She gasped. 

He stopped and lifted his hands. “Sorry! Did I hurt you?”

“Oh, don’t stop. If you stop I’ll have to kill you,” she mumbled.

He smiled haltingly, then returned his hands to her shoulders. “You have to be firm but gentle when you start,” he said. “To warm up the trapezius. If I use too much pressure too soon, or pinpoint pressure with my fingertips, I could damage it. You.”

She grunted. 

His palms moved along her shoulders to her upper arms and squeezed. “Some people forget about the deltoids and biceps, but if you don’t work the arms, the shoulders just tense up again.” He ran his hands down to her elbows, swept back up to her shoulders and the base of her neck, then reversed and rubbed downward along her rib cage. She was jelly. He swept back up along her spine and dug his thumbs into the muscles on the back of her neck, either side of her cervical spine. “If I pull your hair, let me know.”

She reached back and gathered up her hair and pulled it to the top of her head, out of his way. 

“There are muscles underneath the trapezius, and I have to be sure I follow them instead of cross them. That would hurt and just make you tense again. This muscle here,” his thumbs followed the same pattern up, then back down her neck, increasing the pressure, “that’s the splenius capitis, it connects—”

“Hush!” she ordered. “Be quiet. You’re ruining it.”

He stilled. 

“Don’t stop.” It was almost a moan. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. Don’t stop.”

So Harry started again, working down her arms, up her neck to her hairline, down her spine to her lower back. Every time he would ask, “How’s that?” she would whimper “more”. He was starting to work up a sweat, and his own back was starting to ache. 

She’d gone from sitting up in her chair to practically lying across the table and he was bent almost double working on her back. Jenny Delaney walked up to him and “ohhhed” appreciatively. 

“Hi, Jenny,” Harry sighed and stilled his hands as he greeted her. B’Elanna wiggled. He dutifully rubbed her deltoids, swept his palms down to her elbows. Moved them back up.

“I didn’t know you gave massages!” Jenny sounded thrilled. 

“Um, I—”

B’Elanna reached up and grabbed his hand, anchoring it to her shoulder. “Find your own; he’s mine,” she growled. She didn’t bother to open her eyes. Harry’s eyes popped.

Jenny drew back and pursed her lips, then grinned. She mouthed the word ‘bye’ and moved behind him, further into the room. 

“Ummm, B’Elanna,” Harry said. “You look pretty relaxed now.” She looked like a puddle of gold and black goo. “And it’s getting kind of late. Maybe, I dunno, you should go to bed?”

“Mmumph,” she replied. 

“And it’s starting to fill up in here again.” That woke her.

She dragged herself upright and blinked, looking around. He was right, there were more people here, a few eating, most socializing. More than a few were glancing their way. 

“You look a little wobbly. Want me to walk you to your quarters?”

She stood and smiled, and patted his arm. “Sure. Thanks. That was wonderful.” Her words were a little slurred.

Harry smiled. “It’s better when you’re lying down. Then I can get your whole back.” He offered her his arm and she took it, and they walked out of the messhall together, cold coffee forgotten.

**

“Well, I think they’re adorable!”

“Adorable? I wouldn’t use that word to describe her. Terrifying, maybe. But he’s cute.”

The ship was abuzz with something. Tom had caught snippets of conversation on his way to the mess this morning. Most along the lines of “never would have guessed” and “cute together”. One memorable one was “not her type”, another “bet he couldn’t say no” rejoindered by “too scared to say no”.

It was intriguing. It was a mystery. Obviously there was a new couple on board and he was out of the loop. The ‘he’ could be almost anybody: a woman’s definition of cute varied greatly. There was probably someone onboard who thought Tuvok was cute. But the ‘she’, that was a different matter altogether. Which she was terrifying? The Captain? Maybe, in the right mood. But would she throw ‘fleet decorum to the astral winds and take up a romantic relationship with a crew member? Not likely, not yet. Give her ten years, he thought. He put her on the long list.

Who else? Jenny Delaney was sometimes a little pushy, over eager, but no one would describe that sweetheart as terrifying. Henley seemed to be permanently cranky. Sue Nicoletti was a bit of a cold fish but engineers could get too involved in their work… wait. Wait a minute. He did know someone who could scare the crap out of mortal men when she was in a temper. Not himself, of course, he was made of sterner stuff, plus he had two older sisters. But no. No way. Torres? B’Elanna? In a relationship? She was so guarded, so closed off. It didn’t seem possible. But maybe… Then who? _Lucky bastard_ , he thought. It would have to be someone tough. Someone calming who could stand up to her moods, talk her down when needed, and probably, and Tom’s inner adolescent snickered at this, was in good physical shape. He’d heard about Klingon sexual practices…

Who? Ayala? Naw, he had a wife and kids back in the Alpha Quadrant. Tom stopped dead in his tracks. Chakotay?! No! Yes? They were old friends. They understood each other. She turned to him for guidance, Tom knew, but, no…

By this time he had reached the mess and he hurried inside. His gaze swept the room. No B’Elanna. No Chakotay, either. No Harry. Did he miss a memo? 

“Good morning, Tom.” Neelix greeted him. 

“Hey, Neelix.” Tom bellied up to the counter and gave a bubbling pot a wide berth. “What’s new?”

“Have you heard?!” Neelix was as ebullient as the pot of...whatever that was.

“Heard what?” Play it cool. 

“Well, you must have heard! You’re his best friend! Harry and B’Elanna!”

Tom blinked. “What?”

“Harry and B’Elanna, _Voyager’s_ newest lovebirds! Word has it, I’m so sorry I missed it, that they got together here, in my mess hall, last night!” Neelix was positively beaming. 

Tom shook his head. Noooo… He laughed. “No. No, Neelix, if they were,” he leaned in, lowering his voice, “ _together_ , I’d know. Harry’s my best friend. And B’Elanna and I are friends, sort of. They’d tell me. It can’t be.”

“Wellll,” Neelix said, drawing out the word, “I have it on good authority that he couldn’t keep his hands off her last night. And they left together. He said something about _going to bed…_ ”

Tom drew back as if slapped. His mouth hung open and he was, for once, lost for words. His mouth flapped like a fish for a few seconds before he thought to close it. 

“So,” Neelix smiled, insufferably pleased with himself, “what would you like for breakfast, Tom?”

Tom glanced around the mess hall again, all those heads bent together, none of them Harry’s. “Something portable, Neelix,” he said. His jaw set.

**

“Computer, locate Ensign Kim.”

: _Ensign Kim is in main engineering, deck twelve_ :

Really? Huh. “Computer, locate Lieutenant Torres.”

: _Lieutenant Torres is in main engineering, deck twelve_ :

Were they having a party? A little private party? Tom frowned and harrumphed. How could this happen? When did it happen? Why didn’t he tell him? So, yes, sure, when they’d first been thrown together, two crews melding into one, he’d teased Harry about his Klingon girlfriend. For about ten minutes, until Chakotay had shut that down, making it clear that he didn’t appreciate Tom’s lack of respect for the soon-to-be chief engineer. But Tom hadn’t been serious. The idea of the two of them together was ridiculous. Harry was far too...Harry. And she was way, way too _B’Elanna_. 

When the ‘lift finally dropped him on deck twelve Tom took a moment to compose himself. He had to figure out how to play this: the encouraging best friend thrilled for them both? the hurt best friend chagrined that they’d not told him before it was all over the ship? the disbelieving best friend because the two of them together was ridiculous and they’d both obviously lost their minds?! 

Yeah, that one sounded right. 

He took a gulp of coffee and looked around. Nope, no lovebirds in sight. He glanced upwards but didn’t see them on the upper deck, either. Maybe they were under a console somewhere? “Can I help you, Lieutenant Paris?”

Tom started and sloshed coffee on the deck. “Umm, sorry.” 

Ensign Vorik looked from the puddle on the floor beside his boot back to Tom’s face. “Don’t worry, Lieutenant, I’ll mop that. Is there something you were needing?” He waited. 

“Actually, I was looking for Lieutenant Torres.” He hefted the coffee cup and wondered if Vorik would buy his waiter routine. 

“The lieutenant is in her office.” He nodded toward the other side of the room. 

“Thanks,” Tom said. B’Elanna has an office? Huh. The door was closed, and he walked over wondering if disturbing her was a good idea. Of course, since he didn’t see Harry, he was likely in there with her. So, could it be true after all? Naw, for one thing, the idea was ludicrous, and for another thing, even if it were true, they wouldn’t fool around in her office! With her staff all around her? No way! Harry didn’t have the guts. But he liked to imagine that B’Elanna would. 

He crept closer and hesitated at the door, trying to decide whether to hit the chime or to turn tail and run. Someone moaned. He drew back, shocked! _No. No way._ He pressed his ear to the door, and there it was again, a low, guttural moan followed by, “don’t stop, Harry…” Tom felt the blood drain from his face. His scalp prickled. The words ‘ _get a room_ ’ flitted through his mind, but they had a room: B’Elanna’s office, in the middle of engineering, surrounded by her staff. 

He heard a gasp and made up his mind. He hit the door switch and strode through, pointedly looking at the ceiling. “Do you two have any idea how loud you are?” he hissed. “I could hear you outside the door!” 

“Tom?” B’Elanna sounded bleary.

“What?” Harry was just as confused. 

Tom squinted his eyes shut, then angled his face toward them and slowly, deliberately opened his eyes. B’Elanna was seated at her desk, her jacket off, but otherwise fully dressed, her head pillowed on her bent arms. Harry stood behind her. They were both staring at him. 

“You’re dressed,” Tom stated foolishly. 

“What?!” This from B’Elanna. 

“What’s going on?” Tom asked. 

“She has a headache.”

 _Wait. Wasn’t that the universal excuse for avoiding sex_? Tom’s brain tried to keep up. 

“I was rubbing her neck.” Harry gestured at the semiprone chief engineer.

Tom blinked. “A headache?”

“I’ve been telling her I have to go for the last five minutes,” he sent a skunk eye B’Elanna’s way, “but she won’t let me leave.” He nudged B’Elanna and she wobbled a little. “I told her last night in the messhall she should go to sickbay but she won’t.”

“But then she’d have to deal with the doc,” Tom said. Avoiding sickbay seemed reasonable to him. “Last night, in the mess? You were…?” Tom gestured toward B’Elanna. She shut her eyes and massaged her temples. 

“Yeah. She gets headaches. Muscle strain. Engineering is physical work. It’s not like sitting in a chair all day.” 

“So you were giving her a massage last night. In the mess?” Tom asked. “That’s all?” Harry looked at him funny.

“Hello?” B’Elanna said. Tom looked at her, and she raised an eyebrow at him. He put his mug of coffee on the desk and folded his arms, and she picked it up and took a cautious swallow. “Ohh, it’s real coffee!” _So much for those replicator rations_ , Tom thought. 

“Yeah. You were there, weren’t you?”

Tom grinned, he answered Harry but he was looking at B’Elanna. “Actually, I was sitting in a chair on the bridge last evening.”

Harry’s face brightened. He looked at Tom. “You’re off this morning, aren’t you?” 

“Until twelve hundred, why?”

“You can take over. I’ve gotta go or I’ll be late and Commander Chakotay will give me that look again.” 

He stepped away but B’Elanna caught his hand. “Tell him it’s a medical emergency.” He gently tugged his hand free and walked out. “Harry… damn,” she said. The door slid shut. Her head hit the desk.

“I didn’t know Klingons got headaches,” he said.

“Must be my human half,” she replied, dryly. “What were you doing, charging in here. What did you think was going on?” she mumbled. 

Tom debated. He wasn’t going to tell her he thought _that_ was going on. And he wasn’t going to tell her why; the ship would settle down soon enough when they realized Harry and B’Elanna weren’t a couple after all. And he sure as hell wasn't going to tell her that she was moaning like she was in the throes of orgasmic bliss and he could hear her through her office door! 

“I had to ask Harry something,” he supplied. Quick on his feet, old Tommyboy. 

“I hope it wasn’t urgent.” She rotated her shoulders.

“It’ll keep,” he said, mentally sifting through things he could ask Harry when he saw him later.

“Taaahhmmm…” Her tone of voice was beguiling. No one had ever said his name quite that way before. Soft and breathy and pleading with a hint of promise. He shook himself. 

“What?”

She gestured to her shoulder and grunted. _Well_ , he thought, _let no one say Tom Paris would refuse a challenge_. He tentatively placed his hands on her shoulders and paused. “I’m not actually very good at this.”

“I don’t care.”

“You know, B’Elanna, I’m pretty sure that engineering has an emergency medkit. You could get a hypo from it and take an analgesic.”

“Nrrrph.”

He paused and leaned closer. “What was that?”

“No. Makes me weak.”

 _Weak?_ Tom thought. As in, _what does not kill you, ‘Klingon weak’_ ’ or _a metabolic reaction ‘weak’_?

“Your hands are so warm!” she said dreamily.

“Aren’t Harry’s hands warm?” Tom asked.

“No.”

“Oh. I’m sure his heart is, though.” Tom grinned, proud of himself. 

“Hmmph.” She bucked a little and Tom clamped down on her shoulders, squeezing and digging his thumbs into the base of her neck. She yelped. 

“Sorry.” He lifted his hands. “I told you I’m not much good at this.” 

“You have to start out gently,” she instructed him quietly, “and you can’t dig in with your fingers like that. You’ll damage the muscle.”

He just stared at her. “Harry told me,” she said. 

“Oh.” He tried again, a little more gently. 

“Harder, Tom.”

He added more pressure, and dragged his thumbs up the back of her neck and around toward her jaw. “Eeenk!” She said, and flinched. He was beginning to understand why Harry was so eager to get away. 

She reached back and secured his hand to her neck, rightly guessing that he was on the verge of giving up. “There’s a muscle under the trapezius that runs there. The splenius capitis. You have to be careful to rub along it, not against it or it hurts.” She squinted up at him. 

“Harry?”

“Yeah.”

“And he wondered why I used to call him Ensign Eager.” B’Elanna smiled. “I think I’m doing more harm than good.” Her face fell. Tom sighed. “My sister, Moira, used to get migraines. Real killers. I used to massage her scalp.” The offer was out there.

She looked like a puppy eyeing a bone.

“It’s a little more...intimate.” Tom used to date a girl who wouldn’t allow him to touch her hair. He could look, compliment, but never touch. Tom liked women’s hair. He was drawn to it. B’Elanna looked like she cared about her hair and this would definitely mess it up.

She squinted at him. “If you tell me I have to get undressed, I’ll punch you.”

“Fair warning,” Tom said with a smile. 

“Just do it,” she ordered.

“Okay.” He grinned. He kind of liked it when she ordered him around. “You’ll have to sit up.” Either that or Tom would have to get on his knees. He was tired of folding himself in half to reach her. 

She did so, and he hesitated. The only other time he’d touched her so personally, they’d been trapped together in those mines, terrified that at any moment they’d be taken away for organ processing. Like Pete. They’d grown close in those mines, then fallen away from each other again once they were back on _Voyager_. He placed his fingertips along her hairline from temple to jaw in a parody of a Vulcan mind-meld, and slowly moved them inward and up toward the crown of her head. Her thick, soft hair ran through his fingers. She gasped softly. He moved his fingers in tiny circles, careful not to pull her hair. This time she moaned. 

__

Her head fell back against his belly, and he worked his hands loose, letting her hair fall back to frame her face. She made a little sound of longing, and he shushed her. He moved his fingers back across her skull, pressing the tips firmly, moving in circles, massaging her scalp. “Ohhh, Tom.” Her voice was a whisper. “Just like that. That feels so good.”

__

Tom stared at her, a little stunned. Her head was tipped up slightly, and her eyes were closed. He looked down the rows of her brow ridges, down her nose to her mouth, and her full, slightly parted lips. How the hell had Harry managed to stay upright let alone walk out of the room? He sifted her hair through his fingers again, and settled his thumbs on her temples, his hands cupping the top of her skull. A twitch of his pinky, and he could brush the first brow ridge. It would be so easy to shift his hands and trace her ridges with his fingers, to follow their lines to her temple, then continue to her cheekbones. But he wouldn’t. He hadn’t touched her forehead when she was fully human, even though he’d pushed her hair out of her face. He’d been careful to avoid that smooth, alien part of her. It was too much of a trespass. And he wouldn’t touch her forehead now. But he wanted to. 

__

Instead, he continued to move his fingers in a slow, firm, circular pattern across her skull, to the top then down. He shifted away from her and slid his hands to the back of her head, supporting it and massaging it at the same time. She slumped forward.

__

“If you’re like this with the conn, I’m jealous.”

__

Her voice was barely above a whisper, soft and liquid. _How is it possible that this woman is not dating someone?_ Tom thought. He continued for another five minutes, watching her body relax. She was back in the position she’d been in when he walked into her office: bent at the waist, head pillowed on her arms, but this time she was absolutely relaxed. There was no tension in her back, her shoulders were slumped, her hands lay on her desk palms open, fingers slightly curled. Her hair was messy and fluffed. He bent down, curled his upper body around her to ask quietly, “Does that feel any better?”

__

“Mmmm.” She slid forward, practically lying on her desk.

__

“I’m going to go find a medkit and give you something to make sure the pain doesn’t come back, and you’re going to stay here and relax and not move, okay?” 

__

“Ugh,” she grunted.

__

“I mean it,” he whispered into her ear, his fingers pushing her hair off her cheek. “Not a muscle. I’ll know.”

__

“S’o’kay.” 

__

He stared at her a moment longer, then left her office and found Joe Carey, to his surprise, presumably putting in a little overtime. He explained about B’Elanna’s headache, and was pointed toward a medkit. Joe had shrugged. “If we reported every bump and bruise, we’d be in sickbay all the time.”

__

He paused in the doorway of her office; she looked like she was sleeping. He dialed a combination pain suppressant and low grade muscle relaxant, and pushed her hair back from her throat, even though it wasn’t in the way. _I may never get to touch her hair again_ , he thought. He ran his fingers through the strands, allowing them to fall back behind her other shoulder. He allowed himself that liberty, one last time. Then he pressed the hypo to her neck, and she sighed. 

__

He bent and said softly in her ear, “I’m going now. You’re going to rest for a little while. I’m a medic, and I outrank you, Lieutenant,” she stirred at that. “so that’s an order. Carey can handle anything that comes up in the next hour or so.”

__

“Thanggs,” was her reply, and he smiled.

__

Tom returned the medkit, then found Joe again and told him not to disturb B’Elanna for at least an hour. “Don’t worry, Tom,” Joe said, “we know better than to poke the bear.”

__

Tom laughed at that and headed to sickbay to fill in the Doctor, as per regulations. As a medic, he knew he had to log the medication he’d just given B’Elanna into her medical file. He thought about a hot breakfast, and he thought about more coffee, and he thought about thick, soft, coffee coloured hair. 

__

***

__

**Author's Note:**

> This was based on three real but separate events: my last three-day-long headache, a lost weekend a friend’s cottage, and my partner’s total inability to give a decent massage.


End file.
